Work Text:
The news greeting him at Eastwatch was no better than the tidings he heard at White Harbor. Davos had brought back the youngest Stark boy from Skagos for Lord Manderly, only to be told that Manderly had gone marching to Winterfell.
To aid the Boltons, or Stannis?
Worse news greeted him at Eastwatch (or rumors and confusions), tidings of a pink letter and the fate of Lord Commander Snow. If the King is dead, my Devan must be too, he despaired. He took the Stark boy and his wildling companion with him to Castle Black. At least the boy should be reunited with his half-brother.
It was the red woman he first saw when they arrived at Castle Black. She lives, and my son dies, Davos raged. She was trailed by a boy, nay, a young man, whose face Davos could not see. “Father,” he heard. What sorcery is this? Is she mocking me for losing yet another son?
“Will you not greet you son, Lord Davos? He has been in despair, thinking that his father is dead.” Her voice was as melodious as ever.
Davos was too stunned to reply. He grabbed his son and hugged him, long and hard.
“But how? Why? Why are you here?”
Devan seemed to take the question as a rebuke. “I wanted to march with His Grace, Father, I really did. But His Grace told me that Lady Melisandre had need of my service, and that she had requested for me to attend to her in His Grace’s absence.”
“No, no, my son. I am glad that you are here.”
Later, when they were alone, Davos asked Melisandre the real reason. She shrugged. “You heard your son, Lord Davos. I have need of his service. And I know how loyal and trustworthy your son is.”
“You could have asked for His Grace’s other squire.”
She stared at him with a piercing gaze. “Why do you think I asked for Devan?”
Davos hesitated. Devan had whispered to him his suspicion regarding her real reason.
“Perhaps … it is because I have lost four sons in this war, and you … you do not wish for me to lose more. But why should you care? We have never been friends, you and I. I tried to kill you once.”
She laughed, a full-throated laugh. “I remember. And I doubt that we will ever be friends, Lord Davos. But we are reluctant allies, working towards the same goal. We had differences of opinions on the methods, shall we leave it at that? I have never doubted your loyalty to the king.”
“Thank you, my lady. For my son’s life. And for sparing my wife another despairing news.”
She nodded, and lapsed into a long silence.
We are both thinking of him, but neither one of us wants to be the first to bring him up, thought Davos.
“He grieved for you, when he thought you were dead,” she finally said, very softly. “You were the only man he really trusted.”
“He still had you, my lady,” Davos replied.
I am not a man, Lord Davos, he thought she would reply, but instead, Melisandre said, “He has both of us now. Stannis is not dead.” There was no hesitation in her voice. She was certain of this.
“How do you know, my lady? The letter –“
“I would have seen it in the flame if he is dead.” She sounded less certain this time.
It was not her flame or her god she was basing this conclusion on, Davos finally realized. It was a conviction felt in the bones – I would have known it, felt it, the moment Stannis died. He knew this because he felt that way too. We are each bound to him in our own way. Me, with my finger bones, her … Davos would have said before that she was bound to Stannis by the conviction that he was Azor Ahai reborn, her god’s chosen. But now … now he was not so certain. This is a different sort of bond, a different kind of conviction.
“His Grace could be a prisoner of the Boltons. Or the letter could be a lie. I mean to find out. I will ride to Winterfell myself,” said Davos.
“And I will ride with you, Lord Davos,” replied Melisandre.
_________________________
The northern wind chilled Davos to his bones. He wondered if the Starks changed the words of their House once winter had arrived. What a silly notion, Davos thought. Only a lowborn, once-a-smuggler like myself could have wondered about that.
They had been riding for a full day since leaving Castle Black just after dawn. Davos was not surprised to find Lady Melisandre a more skilled rider than he was. And perhaps with more endurance as well. He had been the one suggesting they halted for the night.
Winterfell. The home of the late Lord Eddard Stark. Even Melisandre was at a loss to explain Stannis’ decision to march there.
“The plan was to gather the support of the mountain clans, and to liberate Deepwood Motte from the Ironborn,” Melisandre had told Davos.
“And did they succeed?”
“Yes, the king sent a raven detailing the capture of Deepwood Motte. But the northmen …”
“The northmen required something else before they will support his claim.”
Davos wondered what Stannis had thought about that. The battle commander in him probably saw it as just another step that must be taken, another battle to be won to win what was his by rights. But what of the man? The man who resented the late Lord Stark for being more like a brother to the late King Robert than Stannis himself had been.
It is not my place to speculate about his thoughts, Davos reminded himself. He is my king, and my liege lord, nothing more than that. Not a friend or a brother, not a –
Davos looked up to find Lady Melisandre staring at him intently. They were sitting on opposite sides of the blazing fire. She does not know what is in my thoughts, Davos told himself. She only knows when it is something that endangers herself.
“No doubt Stannis found the Eddard Stark connection a bitter pill to swallow,” she suddenly said, without any preamble.
He was startled for a moment, before realizing, This is not Melisandre reading my mind. This is her knowing Stannis as a man, as I once knew him too.
So you do not see him merely as your Lord’s chosen and the warrior of fire after all, my lady, Davos thought.
But then, I do not see him merely as a king either. We both see the man.
He thought of Stannis marching through a snowstorm surrounded by people who saw him only as king, or as another doomed pretender to the throne, and his heart ached for Stannis.
It was Davos’ turn to stare at Melisandre. She seemed as calm and as mysterious as ever. He was struck by a sudden thought. “If Stannis is truly your Lord’s chosen, Azor Ahai come again, then surely your god would not let him die at the hands of Bolton’s bastard. Not before the great battle with the true enemy beyond the Wall.”
She remained unperturbed, smiling slyly before replying, “But you do not believe in those prophecies, or in R’hllor, Lord Davos.”
“Yes, but you do, my lady. So how do you explain it?”
“I have seen Stannis leading the fight against the Others in the flame, yes. That is why I am convinced he is not dead. But he could be in danger. And I am but a servant of R’hllor, here to ensure His will is fulfilled.”
“So that is where your loyalty lies, with your god, and not the king?”
She laughed. “Do not pretend to be surprised, Lord Davos. You have always known this.” She paused. Her voice was quieter when she continued, “And Stannis has always known this as well.”
Davos was reflecting on her reply when she suddenly asked. “And what of you, the king’s trusted Onion Knight? Where does your loyalty lie?”
“Everything I am, I owe to King Stannis.”
“Yet you defied him, by spiriting Edric Storm away. That boy could have ensured his victory.”
Not likely, Davos thought. All this talk of sacrifices and waking the stone dragons reminded him why this woman will always be dangerous. She might have saved my Devan, but who knows what she would want done to other children, for her god and her prophecies.
“He was not himself at the time. He was … influenced by others.”
Her laughter rang loud, melodious and musical. “You think very badly of your king indeed, Lord Davos, if you believe that he could be so easily swayed and led around by another person.”
“But you are not just another person, my lady. I have seen with my own eyes your power, what you are capable of, when I rowed you beneath Storm’s End.”
“And who was it who commanded you to row me beneath the castle?”
“Pardon me, my lady?”
“Do not play coy, Lord Davos. You know what I am asking you, because you know Stannis better than anyone. His iron will, his determination, his stubbornness.”
Her words, and what they implied, were something Davos did not wish to reflect on at the moment. He stayed silent, staring at the fire. There was nothing there, only the flame flickering and swaying with the cold northern wind.
“I wish your flame would show us where he is now. If he is dead or alive,” he said, softly.
Melisandre nodded, but did not say a word.
“I was not by his side,” Davos continued.
“It was not your choice. He commanded you to sail to White Harbor.”
“And I suppose he commanded you to stay behind at the Wall because of the northmen and their tree god?”
There was a long, long pause, before she replied. “I had my own reasons for staying at the Wall.”
Perhaps you decided to stay so that he would not have to ask it of you.
The thought came unbidden to him from somewhere, and it puzzled Davos greatly. Why would I think this?
Not for the first time, he wondered about the true nature of the relationship between Stannis and Melisandre. That something had happened between them to create the shadow monstrosity that killed Ser Cortnay Penrose, and perhaps Lord Renly too, was not in doubt to Davos. Melisandre had all but admitted this to Davos, when she visited him in the dungeon at Dragonstone. But was there something else? Something more than mere sorcery to create an evil monstrosity?
He remembered Devan telling him about Lady Melisandre comforting King Stannis in his tent after Lord Renly’s death, when he was troubled by terrible dreams.
Perhaps, Davos thought, as a man who had known other women besides his own wife while he was away from home and lonely at sea, it would not have been such a bad thing, for Stannis to know the comforting touch of a woman.
Was that how she had gained her outsized influence over him? Whispering things in his ears as they … as they …
But Davos also remembered what Stannis had said about trying a new hawk. A red hawk. R’hllor. Even with the boy Edric, Stannis had resisted Melisandre’s request until all three false kings were dead, until he had seen what he deemed as irrefutable proof of R’hllor’s power.
He is terrifying at times, Davos realized. The icy cold determination, the stubbornness, the willingness to –
I tried to convince myself that I was saving Stannis from the red woman when I smuggled that boy away, when in truth, I was trying to save Stannis from himself. And saving others from him.
He pondered his loyalty to Stannis. Am I a craven man? Staying loyal to him despite everything because he had given me a knighthood and a lordship?
But I am not an ambitious man, he answered the reproaching voice in his head. I would have been content with a small plot of land to raise my family.
Perhaps it was the dreams and ambitions I had for my sons. He remembered his pride at his older sons captaining their own ships. And his pride seeing Devan taking his lessons with Princess Shireen, and thinking about how Devan would be a Lord someday. Men would do many things for their children that they would never consider doing for themselves. Woman too, he thought.
The self doubt gnawed at him. Is that what my loyalty to Stannis has been about, all these years? Am I no better than those craven lords yearning for more land, more influence, more power and more glory, if not for themselves, then for their children and their descendants?
And yet, Davos thought, when I told His Grace how I had smuggled Edric Storm out of his reach, he did not throw me in the dungeon, or give me to the Red God, as I had feared. He took my counsel and sailed to the Wall, when I told him to remember his duty rather than his rights. You should save the kingdom to win the throne, I said. And when the northern lords would not support his claim even after he had defeated the wildlings, not a single word of reproach towards me passed his lips. He cursed and swore at those lords, but he never turned to me to say, ‘Look what your counsel has brought me, smuggler. I saved the kingdom, but it did not help me win the throne.’
Davos pondered loyalty, and all its complications. Loyalty forged by gratitude, yes, but also by having your faith rewarded.
“You harbor too many doubts in your heart, Onion Knight.” He was startled out of his reverie by the voice of Lady Melisandre.
“And you do not, my lady?”
“No. The choice is clear. Darkness or light. Good or evil.”
“Someone we both know once told me that a good act does not wash out the bad, nor a bad the good.”
“R’hllor chooses His warrior of light, not me.”
“But perhaps you would have preferred a less stubborn man? Someone more easily bended to your will?”
“I have no will except my Lord’s will.”
“To your Lord’s will, then. A man more easily bended to follow R’hllor’s will.”
“It is not my place to have a preference. R’hllor chooses the prince that was promised, Azor Ahai reborn.” She sounded sad, almost melancholic. Davos could not understand why.
“If Stannis is not Azor Ahai reborn, will you abandon his cause?”
“You would like that, would you not?”
“Yes, I would like an end to all the burning. And for the people who still worship the Seven to be able to worship in peace, without having to watch the destruction of their septs and their gods.”
But you did save my son’s life. And perhaps without you, Stannis would not have the men he has now, Davos grudgingly acknowledged in his mind. He was struck by a sudden thought.
“Are you seeing someone else in your flame, my lady?”
Melisandre was silent.
She is! Davos thought.
“Then why are you riding to Winterfell with me? If Stannis is not your Lord’s chosen?”
“The flame could be … misinterpreted, either now or before. And Stannis is not dead, I am certain of that.”
“I wish I could be as certain as you are, my lady.”
“No, Lord Davos, doubts and uncertainties are what he needs most from you. He has me for all the certainties.”